In Our Garage

November '09

Feature Article from Hemmings Sports & Exotic Car

November, 2009

DAN STROHL, ASSOCIATE Editor--1974 MG Midget
This hasn't been the Midget's best summer. Heather had a chance to drive it around before the deluges, but she got pinched for driving it around sans inspection sticker. So while we watched the rain fall, we holed up in the garage, replacing light bulbs and fuses left and right.
Then we came to the reverse lamps. New bulbs didn't light 'em, and the fuses tested out all right, so I did the double-jointed circus freak thing to remove the switch on the gearbox. Tested just fine. "Must be a short somewhere in the wiring," thought I, and then proceeded to remove the wiring harness from the car so I could test it.
That also tested just fine.
It turned out the connectors on the back of the lamp housings were loose; the repair involved jiggling the wiring harness until the lamps stayed on.
So I garnered an inspection sticker and drove the Midget around for a day or two, long enough to realize it now needs new brakes.
Mike McNessor, Editor--1982 Mercedes-Benz 300D
You might recall back in the August issue I was feverishly welding and grinding on my 300D's hood latch, convinced that the reason the hood wouldn't stay shut was that the female part was worn out. Wrong. On a whim I ordered a new hood release cable from Performance Products and installed it one Sunday afternoon. End of problem. Apparently, the old cable was so dry and sticky it wasn't allowing the latch to return completely to the latched position.
I'm also happy to report that the valve cover gasket replaced in the last issue has greatly cut down on the oil spots beneath the car and, subsequently, the oil consumption. I was so inspired that I even ordered a new gasket for the oil filter housing (where it mounts to the block)--which also appears to be leaking. The biggest drips, however, appear to be coming from the rear main seal, which I'm not likely to fix anytime soon.
Recently, I took the old warhorse on a 300-mile round trip, 75 MPH haul in 90-degree heat. It performed flawlessly, hanging with traffic on the New York State Thruway and achieving 25-plus MPG. On the return run, I swelled with pride when some hippie kids packed into an identical but red W123 Benz pulled alongside, smiling and waving. It was a good day; unfortunately, reality came crashing back when I returned to work that Monday and the right rear window went down but refused to come back up. Sheesh.
As cold weather approaches, I keep toying with the idea of buying something gasoline-fueled, to avoid some of the starting woes I've had in the past three winters and maybe shave a little off my 0 to 60 MPH times. But as much as the car bedevils me with occasional small problems, and as tediously slow as it is compared to modern cars, I continue to be impressed with its day-to-day reliability (I've put 25,000 miles annually on it for 3.5 years!); I love burning biodiesel and vegetable oil in it; and I'm intrigued by the thought of seeing just how many miles I can pile on the odometer.

This article originally appeared in the November, 2009 issue of Hemmings Sports & Exotic Car.